2018: Keep It Simple, Stupid

You may have noticed that I haven’t written in a while, about a month and a half to be exact. When I started this blog, I had just had the idea to write a book. It’s a dream I’ve always had, I was just starting to feel good again after a shit-filled nine months of dealing with my perinatal mental illness. I felt like I was finally happy, finally strong, and ready to do EVERYTHING. The material started pouring out. I started the blog and the Facebook page hoping to involve my friends and grow a little following.

Then my kids got sick, I got sick, we went on vacation,the kids both got sick again for vacation, and all three of us got sick again for Christmas. My feelings of depression and anxiety returned. I stopped writing. I struggled to get my school work done, and I received the lowest grade on a paper I’ve ever gotten. My to-do list keeps growing with nothing getting crossed off. My house is a mess. I’m overwhelmed by all the shit everywhere. Once again, I felt like I had dropped every ball I was supposed to be juggling. I started to resign myself to the fact that I was never going to have my shit together.

So I’ve been crying a lot. Crying because I feel so overwhelmed. Crying because my baby’s birthday is coming up and I’m still grieving losing her infancy to PMAD. Crying because I’m generally a train wreck. I was crying at work on NYE and having a group therapy session with my coworkers (I love you guys), and a friend told me she looks for the silver lining in dealing with anxiety. Why did God give this illness to me? I’m not a religious person, but I decided to try it. For the New Year, I sat and really reflected on my year. I tried to receive the message.

The message fell on my head like a ton of bricks. PUT DOWN THE BALLS. Stop the juggling act. Slow the fuck down. To borrow from my 12-step friends,keep it simple, stupid!

This is something my friends (ahem…Carrie), my mom, and my therapist have been trying to tell me for a long time. But here’s my secret, I’m a closet overachiever. I thought constantly moving on to the next goals and being the best at everything, all while making it look like I wasn’t trying very hard, I thought that was bringing me happiness. I thought that if I could just get back to managing it all while making it look easy, that’s when I would be back to my old self. But now I realize the overburdening has to stop! The universe has been trying to tell me for a while, and I’m finally going to listen. When the pain gets great enough and all that.

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One Comment

I know the phrase doesn’t mean much but I’m so sorry for your lost 😦 I can’t imagine the pain. But keep your head up and lean on people for support, it’s out there. Also sorry about the depression, I battle it everyday.